Nature's Bounty
by Simbelmyne
Summary: [MGS3] “Do you always go around eating suspicious-looking frogs, sir?” EVA, Ocelot. Implied SnakeOcelot, courtesy of EVA’s runaway imagination. Spoilers, language, one-shot.


_Disclaimer: Metal Gear Solid is the property of Hideo Kojima. I am not profiting from this work. It is a work of fiction written by a fan, for fans. Not for sale or rent. Please do not redistribute without notifying me. _

_A/N: You know, even though EVA does end up pulling a Master Miller on Naked Snake, I still can't help but like her. How many leading ladies do you know who actually push for slash relationships between two of the leading males? That just scores a whole lot of Super Awesome points in my mind. _

_Anyway, this fic is based on a radio conversation you can have with EVA after getting your stuff back, just before you ascend the ladder behind the waterfall into Groznyj Grad. Now, if EVA won't eat raw snakes and crocodiles, just where the hell did all of Snake's food go...?_

It hadn't been easy getting her hands on Snake's equipment, but it hadn't been impossible, either. Most of guards had deferred to her simply because she was Volgin's current woman; she had ways of dealing with those who were bright enough to realize that Volgin didn't care what she did, as long as she was there when he wanted her. A few promises which she didn't intend to keep had been made, and a few rubles had changed hands (though most of the smart soldiers in Groznyj Grad asked for American dollars these days), until finally, Snake's gear had ended up in her care.

Some of his things had gone missing, she noted sadly; one of the guards had stolen a cigarette case, and others had picked out some of his Calorie Mates. She didn't really blame them, though; after all, Snake _had_ blown up Groznyj Grad's food stores, plunging morale to an all-time low. Even she was a little annoyed with him; she didn't like having to go from instant noodles to Russian rations.

And speaking of food...

'_I wonder...has he been eating those noodles I gave him...?'_

No one was around. She could afford to be a little curious.

She started to poke through Snake's backpack and made a mental note to let him pack the suitcases, should they be going on a trip together any time in the near future. It was simply amazing, the sheer amount of _stuff_ he had somehow managed to squeeze into such a tiny space. At least six different suits of camouflage...many guns of varying sizes...five different kinds of grenades...a rather large mine detector...a folded-up cardboard box...a crocodile-shaped hat, what the hell...aha. She finally found what she was looking for: his food.

Everything had been wrapped in cloth and carefully marked. Some of it was leaking blood, she noticed with distaste, and set those packages aside. She pocketed the instant noodles and Calorie Mates. Most of the fish smelled funny, and she threw those right into the garbage; she wasn't going to take those things with her out of Groznyj Grad if they smelled that bad, even if they were still edible. Some of the other animals just made her cringe: scorpions, cobras, little bloody birds...he was _eating_ all of these. _Raw_, no less. And she thought the emergency rations in Groznyj Grad were bad.

He had a good amount of fruit in there, too; they were also wrapped in cloth. He had scribbled notes on some of the wrappers: _Golova: Yummy; Siberian Ink Cap: Gross; Russian False Mango: Eat for upset stomach, per PM; _and so on For being constantly hunted in the jungle, he managed to take pretty extensive notes.

She set the fruit aside and continued looking. On the bottom of the pack were three small boxes. She pulled them out and, without bothering to read the label, opened one of them.

She blinked. The snake blinked. Then it lunged.

_BANG!_

EVA spun around quickly, trying to use her frame to block the evidence of her crime, but Ocelot had obviously already seen exactly what she was doing. He blew the smoke away from the barrel of his revolver as he walked towards her. With one hand he prodded the now-dead Thai cobra and, eyeing EVA suspiciously, said, "_Tanya_. How did you get Snake's things?"

Dammit. This guy was worse than a stalker. "I..."

"I've been looking for this, and the soldiers out there said that _you_ were very keen to get your hands on it." Looking pensive, he briefly spun his revolver, then pointed it at her face. "What're you up to, Tatyana?"

"Nothing! S-something..._smelled_ bad...in there" she said, making sure that her voice trembled. She wasn't EVA right now, she was Tatyana: passive, obedient, and easily frightened by everyone, even this bratty child and his toys. Ooh, if she only had her Mauser, he'd know what a _real_ gun was like... "I didn't want it festering in there. I j-just wanted to throw it out. S-sir." The lies rolled off her tongue effortlessly, and she was sure that that had been some of today's best trembling.

Ocelot spun his revolver in his right hand and began to pace around her, looking at every inch of her body critically. "That's not the only thing that stinks in here." He leaned close to her shoulder and sniffed her neck.

'_Damn perfume,'_ she thought. _'I really wish he would stop doing that. It's creepy. If you really want to borrow it that much, Ocelot, all you've got to do is ask.' _She sighed imperceptibly. _'At least he's not grabbing my chest anymore. I still can't believe I lost control and hit him like that...good thing Volgin thought I was just being feisty, or that could have cost me the whole mission...'_ She followed Ocelot very carefully with her eyes as he moved around her throat. _'Assuming it hasn't already...'_

"What?" she finally asked, annoyed that he hadn't stopped sniffing her after a solid minute. "Do I smell that bad, sir?"

"No, it's more like...familiar. Yes. You smell familiar...and not in a good way," he muttered, twirling his revolver distractedly. The bloody packages on the table caught his eyes, and he holstered his revolver. "Blood?"

"Animals," she explained evenly. "He's probably eating these when he can't find any real food. Some of them are starting to go bad, which is why I wanted to throw them out."

"Why? Are you worried that he might get sick?" Ocelot sneered. "He's not going to be getting this back, Tatyana. He's not going _anywhere_."

'_That's what you think_,' she thought smugly as she started to put the food back in Snake's bag. _'If I know Snake, he's already gotten out and is on his way to the rendevous point right now.'_

"Wait," Ocelot said suddenly, grabbing her wrist. "Let me see what he's got in there."

"Umm...why, sir?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but knowing one's enemy is one of the most important parts of battle. For me to fully understand Snake, I must _think like_ Snake." He tapped his forehead for emphasis. "Only then can I truly defeat him."

"Uh-huh."

"And," he continued, ignoring the look she was giving him, "if I want my brain to function like Snake's, I'm going to have to give it the same kind of fuel that Snake gives his brain." He pushed her aside and started pawing through Snake's food.

"What, raw snakes and crocodiles?"

"If that's what Snake's eating, that's what I'm going to eat," Ocelot said, determined. "Don't you _understand_, Tatyana? This is so much more than just a score to settle! I have to defeat him...I have to _force_ him into submission...complete, perfect, utter submission..." He got a far-off look in his eyes, and EVA coughed, bringing him back to earth. "And to do that, I need to understand what drives him. If it's raw snakes and crocodiles, well, so be it." He opened one of the cages and picked out a bright green frog by its legs.

"Wait, sir, that's a _live _frog, you're not _really _going to...eeeeew. That's _really _gross. Do you always go around eating suspicious-looking frogs, sir?"

"If they're the same suspicious-looking frogs that Snake's eating, then yes," Ocelot said, smacking his lips, and EVA was pleased to see that his face was already greenish. Heh. Ocelot was a noodles-and-rations kind of boy. He might be handy with a gun, but she couldn't imagine him using it for anything other than stupid parlor tricks; certainly not for capturing his own food. There were at least ten more packages of raw animal meat in the bag, and she was pretty sure that the last cage had another poisonous snake in it. He'd never make it through them all.

"How's it taste, sir?"

"Vile," he said, glaring at her as he picked up a small package wrapped in cloth and leaking a small amount of blackish blood. "Let's see... 'Red Avadavat.' Have you ever had one of these, Tatyana?"

She shook her head. "Can't say I have, sir."

"Oh well," he said, opening the package and eating the dead bird inside without any hesitation. She winced as he crunched on a bone, then spit the fragments out into the bloody cloth.

"Oh God, sir! Shouldn't you at least...I don't know, pick those out first?"

"Do you think Snake has the time to go around _skinning _and _cleaning _his food?" Ocelot said, looking at her like she was some kind of idiot. "Because _I_ think that being hunted in the jungle would make proper dressing a _bit_ difficult." He pulled a small bone out of his mouth, tearing the meat off with his teeth, and threw it unceremoniously over his shoulder.

"Maybe you should ask him before you choke to death on the bones, sir." _'Not that I'd mind that, but I have to at least pretend to be concerned.'_

"I can't do that," Ocelot replied. "What happens if he finds out I'm trying to be like––I mean, eat like him? He changes his diet to throw me off! And then all this goes to waste. Make no mistake, Tatyana, I won't eat raw animals for just _anyone_." He nodded fiercely and bit into a Reticulated Python to punctuate his statement.

'_My God, he's obsessed,'_ she thought, taking a few steps back. _'That's really, really creepy. And kind of sexy. Wait, no, it's _my_ mission to seduce Snake, dammit!'_ She glared at Ocelot, who was sampling a Sunda Whistling-Thrush with interest._ 'I swear, Ocelot, if you seduce Snake and compromise my mission, I'll break your trigger fingers.'_

"What are you staring at?" Ocelot asked, noticing her angry eyes as he plucked the feathers off the thrush before shoving it into his maw.

"Oh. Umm...you've got some blood on your lip, sir."

"Huh," he murmured, flicking it off. Actually, he had blood on most of his face, but she didn't bother telling him that. Him trying to explain his gore-splattered face and uniform would be more amusing, even if she probably wouldn't be there to see it.

Ocelot was tearing though Snake's food faster than a fire in the jungle. EVA could only stare. She'd never seen anyone eat so voraciously, and it wasn't even like Ocelot was that hungry.

"Acquiring a taste for raw stuff, eh, sir?" she asked as he threw aside the bones of another small bird––maybe a Magpie, but she couldn't tell. God, this was just disgusting. She was used to blood, but the skin and fur and little _bones_ everywhere were just...ugh. Like an animal's den. It didn't smell all that great, either.

"Ocelots prefer whole prey," he growled, just like a cat, taking his attention away from the markhor leg in his hands for a brief second to glare acidly at her.

"Of course they do, sir," she said, turning away as he began to devour the raw goat. '_I'm surrounded by crazies_,' she thought. _'Volgin's bad enough by himself, but the Cobras are...well, they're all dead, but they _were_ all pretty touched in the head. Not to mention these Russian guards are so desperate, they'll eat almost anything, and they're _much_ too easy to distract...Snake was never really right in the head to begin with, and now Ocelot's starting to think he actually _is_ a cat...is The Boss really the only sane person around here?'_

"This would taste a lot better with ketchup," Ocelot said thoughtfully, "but Snake probably doesn't have ketchup in the jungle, does he?"

"No, sir."

"I was speaking rhetorically," Ocelot sneered, before diving back into the markhor leg, making plenty of lip-smacking noises. EVA was certain he was only doing that to annoy her, and it was working. Not only that, she thought, resting her head in her hand as she racked her brain, but how could she possibly get Snake's gear safely out of Groznyj Grad if Ocelot had firmly planted himself over it?

"Urk."

EVA looked at Ocelot, who was holding one hand over his mouth and one hand on his stomach.

"Something wrong, sir?"

Ocelot swallowed and managed to grate out, "Tastes..._bad_..."

EVA leaned close to what he had just been snacking on––a bat––and sniffed it. "Whew! Ah, so _that's_ what's been going bad in there!" Smiling sweetly at Ocelot, she swept the offending carcass into the garbage. "Thanks for finding it for me, sir; I really didn't feel like picking through all those dead things."

Ocelot glared daggers at her as he shakily stood up and started to leave.

"Sir, are you finished? Where are you going?" she asked with mock ignorance. She knew full well that he was going to the...

"Bathroom. _Now_." He stumbled out and was gone

'_Don't let the door hit you on the way out, you loon. And don't eat it, either,'_ she added as an afterthought as she happily shoved the refuse into the garbage, swiftly rearranged the contents of Snake's backpack, and, taking a quick peek around to make sure no one was watching, quickly made her way outside and headed towards the rendevous point.

Unfortunately for her, a moment later, the alarm sirens started to blare...


End file.
